TUSCALOOSA, Alabama - Steve Spurrier was right about one thing. Nick Sa­ban does have a nice little gig going.

Every fall, his Alabama foot­ball team wins a lot of games and puts itself in the national championship hunt heading into November.

Every other year, his team wins the national champi­onship.

Every spring, his team trots out new names and faces, full of potential, to take the place of the old guys, their legacy stamped in crystal and cement, as they move on toward the first round of the NFL Draft.

Oh, and lots and lots of Ala­bama fans show up on a day better suited to a motorcycle ride on a country road to watch some of the best defensive players in college football not hit the quarterback and the best coach in the game walk around in a suit.

That kind of sustained excel­lence can lead to complacency, and there was a hint of satisfac­tion Saturday in Bryant-Denny Stadium. The announced at­tendance, with the usual no ad­mission charge, was "only" 78,526. That's the "smallest" spring-game crowd since "only" 78,200 showed up in 2008.

When Saban sees that stat, he might go on statewide televi­sion and demand that every Al­abama fan that wasn't there drop and give him 20.

After the game, after the White team led by the first­-team defense naturally beat the Crimson team led by the first-­team offense 24-15, Saban sounded as if he'd been barking at someone.

"You know, one thing that never happens in college foot­ball," he said in a hoarse and raspy scratch. "Nobody ever has a bad spring, and nobody ever has a bad spring game. We didn't have one, either."

Around here, it helps that no­body else has the same amount of raw talent to develop each and every spring that Alabama does. Take Spurrier, for exam­ple. He was fortunate to sign one Marcus Lattimore. All Sa­ban's done is follow Mark In­gram (Heisman Trophy winner) with Trent Richardson (Heis­man second runner-up) and follow Richardson with T.J. Yel­don.

It's way too early to put the stiff-arm statue in the same sentence as the true freshman tailback from Daphne, but Yel­don did some things Saturday that made him look more than ready for big-boy football.

There was a 20-yard burst, highlighted by a stop-and-go move, early in the third quarter. On the next snap, he bounced a sweep to the sideline for 15 more yards. He also got tossed down like an official's bean bag in the backfield by one of de­fensive lineman LaMichael Fanning's strong arms, but Yel­don didn't stay down.

Later in the third quarter, he took a simple dump pass from backup quarterback Phillip Sims, ran through an attempted arm tackle by juco cornerback Travell Dixon and raced the rest of the way untouched for a 50-yard touchdown.

Eddie Lacy might want to get well soon. The expected start­ing tailback has another legiti­mate challenger for snaps and carries.

Yeldon carried 16 times for 88 yards and caught five balls for 91 yards to earn the media's nod as the game's MVP. He could turn out to be Alabama's biggest get -- and Auburn's biggest regret after switching his commitment -- from the signing class of 2012.

If the spring game was, as Sa­ban called it, "a bit of a final exam" for his players, it really was A-Day for Yeldon.

"T.J. did a good job in all the scrimmages," Saban said. "He was the difference in the game for his team. . . . We needed somebody like that. He has a really good opportunity."

Sa­ban noted that Lacy will come back from his turf-toe surgery and that Jalston Fowler and Dee Hart each "can do certain things." And Yeldon?

"T.J.'s kinda one of those guys that can do everything."

Saban said it. He was a bit more cautious about the team as a whole, but you can go ahead and book it. Come No­vember, Alabama will be in the chase for another BCS title.